Man Tattoos Dog in North Carolina

It’s the talk in the animal welfare world right now; a tattoo artist tattooed his pit bull supposedly while she was already under anesthetic to crop her ears.

According to WWII12, Ernesto Rodriguez tattooed his 5-month-old American bully. Rodriguez says the dog named Duchess was asleep while he tattooed her. He then posted pictures of the tattoo on Facebook.

The tattoo is a large belly tattoo that Rodriguez claims is for identification. WGHP reported his other dog, Duke, also has a tattoo.

“Really, that’s kind of suspicious in my mind,” said Caleb Scott, an animal activist and president of N.C. Voters for Animal Welfare.

“Usually when you pick up a dog or cat from the vet, they’re already awake after a procedure. They don’t usually hand you over a dog that’s asleep,” Scott said.

Scott also says before the posts were removed, Rodriguez wrote on his Facebook page that he was “bored and tattooing.”

Stokes County officials in North Carolina issued this press release earlier this week:

“Stokes County Government is investigating a report that an unlicensed tattoo business is being operated in the county at 1396 Millsap Road, Pinnacle, NC which is not zoned for this type of business. A “Cease and Desist Order” on the tattoo business has been issued by the Health Department to the residents located at this address. Should the County’s investigation reveal any illegal activities occurring at this residence, appropriate actions will then be taken.”

While Rodriguez may not have violated any animal cruelty statutes, many people on Facebook have posted angry comments about the tattooing, some of them pointing out that tattoo artists are only supposed to tattoo on people who consent and dogs cannot consent.

However, Dogster reports that Rodriguez is unapologetic on his Facebook page: “Animal control came looked at my beautiful dog and left.... wow... what a waste of tax payers money... so im still gonna tattoo my dogs whenever i feel like it... good try haters thanks for all the advertisement."

I personally didn’t think it would take long after seeing people crop their dog’s ears and tails, dye their hair and perform plastic surgery on them to make them “perfect” that people would start tattooing their dogs.